Tag: Care

  • Navigating the path to higher education after local authority care

    Navigating the path to higher education after local authority care

    Young people in England with experience of children’s social care face significant barriers to entering and succeeding in higher education.

    Our research at TASO – Pathways into and through higher education for young people with experience of children’s social care – conducted alongside the Rees Centre, University of Oxford, highlights significant and concerning disparities.

    For example, at the age of 22, compared with the general population, care leavers and those who have ever been in care are four times less likely to enter higher education – 14 per cent of care-experienced people versus 56 per cent of the general population. Of those care leavers who do make it into higher education, 18 per cent drop out, more than double the withdrawal rate of their peers in the general population.

    And it’s not just care leavers who experience unequal outcomes. The research looked more widely at anyone with experience of children’s social care – a group that is around 20 times larger than the care leaver population – and found stark inequalities in their access to and experience of higher education compared not only to the general population, but also compared to those eligible for free school meals. For example, “children in need” are two to three times less likely to attend higher education than the general population.

    These results suggest that the experience of children’s social care has a lasting impact on educational prospects, and that the needs of affected young people are not being met by the current support system. Although the findings are perhaps not surprising, they are still shocking. Our report aims to act as a call to action for universities, policymakers and those seeking to close equality gaps in higher education.

    Routes to an unlevel playing field

    Not only is there an uphill struggle to the higher education “playing field” for those who have been in care, once there, the playing field itself is far from level. The data shows that getting those with experience of children’s social care into university is only the first challenge to address, and the high dropout rate demonstrates that targeted work is required to improve retention and support systems.

    Care leavers – and others with experience of children’s social care – often take alternative routes to university. Over one-third (36 per cent) of care leavers take a vocational pathway, compared to just 13 per cent of the general population, and they are more likely to start university later in life rather than at the traditional age of 18. This suggests that the traditional academic pipeline does not serve them effectively, and that policymakers should aim to support these alternative pathways and set strategies for recruiting mature learners.

    Care leavers and entry rates

    There are some differences between those with experience of children’s social care overall and care leavers specifically. Although care leavers have poorer outcomes on most measures, care leavers have a relatively high entry rate at age 18/19, compared to other groups who have experienced children’s social care.

    This could be due to a higher level of support being made available for this group in the transition from post-16 settings to higher education, reinforcing the importance of targeted interventions.

    Accommodation outside of term time

    Accommodation is another crucial area where care-experienced people are at a disadvantage, often without a stable home to go to during the term breaks. We need closer collaboration between local authorities and higher education providers to ensure they are collectively meeting their duty of support to care-experienced learners, and especially care leavers where the state has a corporate-parent responsibility.

    This is one clear area where more joined-up working is needed to help ensure that care-experienced students have somewhere suitable to stay when universities close their doors outside of term time.

    The people within the statistics

    It is also important to note that many with experience of children’s social care enter higher education and thrive. As with all statistical reports, focusing on averages, however derived, risks missing the many important exceptions. That is, some individuals succeed despite the relatively long odds of doing so, and we should not interpret statistical results in a causal or absolute way.

    We hope, in particular, that Virtual School Heads – a regional role that acts as a headteacher for all children with a social worker within a particular local authority – will find the research helpful when working on the strategic goal of improving educational inclusion and participation for care-experienced children and young people.

    A call for change

    The research underscores the fact that universities – including more selective or prestigious institutions – should rethink their approach to recruiting and supporting those with experience of children’s social care.

    We outline some of the ways to support these groups – by recruiting mature learners, those from vocational pathways, and by strengthening retention strategies. One possible idea, previously suggested by the Social Market Foundation, is that providers could be offered an additional £1,000 for each care leaver they recruit as a “student premium”, beyond existing accommodation support. At TASO, we want to see higher education providers evaluating their interventions to attract and support those with experience of children’s social care, so we can start to build a picture of what works to benefit these students.

    Our report makes it clear: universities, policymakers and local authorities must work together to ensure that those with experience of children’s social care are not left behind. The challenges they face in accessing and completing higher education are not inevitable but significant and targeted support is required to change the status quo. If higher education is a vehicle for social mobility, the continued focus on underrepresented groups – including those with experience of children’s social care – is vital.

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  • There’s nothing certain about the circumstances when a duty of care applies to students

    There’s nothing certain about the circumstances when a duty of care applies to students

    The Secretary of State for Education was recently asked in Parliament if she would meet with campaigners to discuss the “duty of care” owed by higher education providers to their students.

    Janet Daby – the Minister for Children, Families and Wellbeing in the Department for Education (DfE) responded on her behalf, and also outlined the department’s current view on the law for holding negligent institutions to account.

    At first glance, her response was unhelpful – arguing the department’s position is that a duty of care in higher education may arise in “certain circumstances”:

    Such circumstances would be a matter for the courts to decide, based on the specific facts and context of the case being considered, and will be dependent on the application by a court of accepted common law principles.

    It would be easy to argue that lawmakers, including Janet Daby and skills minister Jacqui Smith, should not simply defer to the courts on matters of law and institutional accountability.

    After all, lawmakers have the power to create laws – so overall responsibility doesn’t rest solely with judges and their judicial interpretation of common law principles.

    But perhaps Daby’s response was more helpful than it looked – because it directly confronts misleading statements that have persisted since 2023, particularly those made by former Minister Robert Halfon.

    Although some might view her answer as a cautious response, in reality, it was a breath of fresh air – a much-need step in addressing the confusion that has clouded our understanding of legal responsibilities in higher education.

    From Halfon’s Law to Daby’s Law

    To grasp the significance of Janet Daby’s correction, we must first revisit the origins of the confusion – what I’ll call here Halfon’s Law.

    Introduced by Robert Halfon in 2023, it laid the foundation for a misrepresentation of the legal duties owed by higher education providers to their students. Halfon’s Law is a belief that stemmed from a misunderstanding of online material, initially presented in a now-deleted AMOSSHE blog that was published in 2015.

    In responding to the 128,000+ registered voters who signed our parliamentary e-petition calling for a statutory duty of care, Halfon asserted his department’s belief that universities already owed their students a broad and generalised duty of care. He said:

    Higher Education providers do have a general duty of care to deliver educational and pastoral services to the standard of an ordinarily competent institution and, in carrying out these services, they are expected to act reasonably to protect the health, safety and welfare of their students. This can be summed up as providers owing a duty of care to not cause harm to their students through the university’s own actions.

    At first glance, this might sound reasonable, but in truth, it was far from accurate. By conflating a general moral and legal principle – to act in a way that avoids causing harm to others – with a formal, court recognised duty of care that only arises in specific, legally-defined circumstances and relationships, Halfon introduced a dangerous oversimplification.

    It was a distortion used to justify dismissing the petitioners’ call for a statutory duty of care, effectively silencing important conversations about the protections that students need.

    Halfon’s Law, with the documented source having now been quietly removed from its original website, was a misstep in understanding the complexities of legal responsibilities in higher education. Its fall from grace is something to be celebrated.

    Enter Daby’s Law: Janet Daby’s response marks a shift towards legal clarity. A duty of care may arise in certain specific circumstances, but ultimately, it is the courts that will determine the existence and application of any such duty on a limited case-by-case basis – should lengthy and costly litigation ever actually occur.

    As it stands therefore, nobody truly knows what protections are in place, leaving students vulnerable, and institutions at risk of being punished for failing to do the right thing. As such, Daby’s position not only corrects the errors of Halfon’s Law, but also raises significant concerns, including the urgent need for a properly codified duty that both universities and their students can understand.

    The advocacy that led to Daby’s law

    Daby’s correction of the record didn’t happen by chance. It was the direct result of relentless behind-the-scenes efforts from advocates, especially ForThe100, who recognised the need to dismantle Halfon’s contention? – since it was a significant barrier preventing meaningful progress.

    For too long, Halfon’s Law and its sweeping and factually incorrect statements had clouded the conversation around student safety and wellbeing, effectively stopping us from moving forward and pushing for the protections students desperately need. Too many policymakers thought it true – and so dismissed the need for a dedicated duty.

    The subtle shift in content and tone, while preferable to outright inaccuracy, introduces its own set of challenges. Without clear or codified guidance, students, families, and institutions are left to navigate a murky and uncertain legal landscape.

    That vagueness is deeply problematic. It means widespread confusion about rights and responsibilities, leaving institutions uncertain of their obligation, and exposed to unforeseen legal liabilities – while students are left unsure of the protections they can depend on.

    Worse, the lack of clear, direct, and upfront standards is a reactive rather than proactive system, shifting the burden onto individuals to seek legal recourse only after harm has occurred.

    This approach neither prioritises prevention nor ensures accountability, leaving gaps in a system meant to put students first.

    It is now crucial that the government corrects the public response to our petition without delay. Halfon’s Law remains embedded in the official narrative, and its continued presence in government communications perpetuates confusion, and blocks meaningful progress.

    More importantly, for over five decades, students have been without adequate legal protection, and this gap continues to undermine their safety and wellbeing.

    Nobody should be reassured by a duty that arises in “certain circumstances” where those circumstances would be a matter for “the courts to decide”. Students and universities need instead to know where they stand – with the same sort of clarity on offer for the duty of care that universities as employers owe to their staff.

    The next step is for the government to act – taking concrete steps toward enacting statutory reform that holds higher education institutions accountable for their acts and omissions with regard to student safety and wellbeing, and giving students and their families the confidence that when they enrol into a university, they know the minimum “duty of care” that they can actually expect.

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  • The courts are slowly clarifying universities’ duty of care

    The courts are slowly clarifying universities’ duty of care

    Imagine you’re a student, a member of staff, a parent or even an MP trying to work out what type, level or nature of “duty of care” is owed by a university to students.

    The other day Janet Daby, whose day job is Minister for Children, Families and Wellbeing but who also moonlights as a kind of spokesperson for HE given that Jacqui Smith is in the Lords, was asked about duty of care.

    Her answer was as follows:

    The department’s position is that a duty of care in HE may arise in certain circumstances. Such circumstances would be a matter for the courts to decide, based on the specific facts and context of the case being considered, and will be dependent on the application by a court of accepted common law principles.

    That’s unhelpful enough – but the courts don’t seem to be very clear either. Of relevance down this rabbit hole, there’s a fairly lurid bit of press coverage doing the rounds on a case involving a law student at Cambridge who has sued the university for its refusal to award him a PhD.

    The Mail, with its usual insinuative air quotes, runs the headline as follows:

    Cambridge law student sues university after he failed his PhD, claiming it held up his career as a barrister because he was “less able” to write a thesis.

    The case itself is interesting because of the way in which the judge in a recent appeal has differentiated between different bits of law that are supposed to protect students.

    And in a context of disabled students routinely reporting problems with the way in which reasonable adjustments are delivered, there could be significant implications, depending on what happens next, for practice in the future.

    Background

    Jacob Meagher is a disabled PhD student at Cambridge who alleges that he was not provided with an adequate supervisor or advisor, and was denied certain scholarships – acts which he claims were acts of victimisation.

    He previously brought a claim against the university on those issues in 2017, and reached a settlement in 2019 which involved him restarting his PhD. But he alleges he was subjected to a number of detriments after the settlement – crucially, that in connection with his PhD examination, the university was aware of the adjustments he needed to avoid a disadvantage because of his disability, but failed to provide them.

    That’s partly because they had been recommended by the university’s Accessibility and Disability Resource Centre (ADRC) in a plan, but not implemented in the department, which is the sort of scenario that Disabled Students UK’s research suggests is common.

    That, Meagher claims, led to a suicide attempt and hospital admissions – things he claims the university was made aware of but refused to help or support him. Then following complaints, the university recognised the issues with the initial viva and is working to ensure a fair process for his re-examination.

    But even though the university agreed to let the student re-defend his thesis and implement reasonable adjustments, he took the university to court for several reasons:

    • The case includes additional claims beyond the failure to implement reasonable adjustments during the initial viva. He alleges various breaches of the Equality Act 2010, including victimisation and discrimination, stemming from incidents throughout his PhD program. These include claims of inadequate supervision, vetoing of scholarships, and mishandling of complaints.
    • Meagher is seeking compensation for damages already incurred. He claims that the university’s actions have caused him financial losses, including missed opportunities for a tenancy as a barrister due to the delay in completing his PhD. He is also seeking general damages for the distress and harm to his mental health caused by the university’s alleged actions.
    • He is seeking a legal declaration that the university unlawfully discriminated against him, validating his claims and potentially influencing future practice at the university. He is also seeking to clarify legal issues concerning the university’s obligations ahead of that agreed re-examination.

    The university or individuals?

    When he initially brought his claim in August 2023, he included six individuals as defendants in the case – all senior employees of the university that held specific leadership roles within the departments and committees relevant to his complaints.

    He argued that in addition to the liability of their employer under section 109, section 110 of the Equality Act 2010 allows individuals to be held personally liable for acts of discrimination committed in the course of their employment.

    Meagher’s argument was that these individuals, by virtue of their positions, were responsible for the university’s decisions and actions that he alleged were discriminatory and caused him harm. So he sought a declaration from the court that these individuals had discriminated against him, in addition to the declaration sought against the university.

    The university’s legal team argued that including these individuals as defendants provided no tangible benefit to Meagher as the university had acknowledged its liability for discriminatory acts committed by its employees, and that the claims against them were duplicative and unnecessarily increased the cost and complexity of the legal proceedings.

    The County Court Judge hearing the initial applications in the case agreed with the university’s arguments and struck out the claims against the individuals, citing the “Jameel principle” that allows the courts to strike out claims that are technically valid but considered an abuse of process due to the disproportionate costs and burden they impose on the defendants compared to the potential benefit to the claimant.

    And on appeal, a High Court judge has now agreed – hence the headlines. But it’s where the High Court has disagreed with the County Court where things get interesting.

    Breach of contract?

    In the County Court, Meagher argued that the university’s failure to implement adjustments recommended by the ADRC for his viva constituted not just breaches of the Equality Act 2010, but also breaches of contract and tort – and once you’re in that space the legal principles of foreseeability of harm, and the duty of care in providing services with reasonable skill and care, kick in.

    On the duty to avoid foreseeable harm, the principle basically means that individuals and organisations have a legal responsibility to take reasonable steps to prevent harm that is reasonably foreseeable as a consequence of their actions or omissions. If the Court determines that the harm Meagher experienced (e.g. psychological distress, academic setbacks) was a foreseeable consequence of the university’s failure to implement the adjustments, that would strengthen his claim for breach of contract and tort.

    Then there’s the duty of care in carrying out a service with reasonable skill and care issue. That’s enshrined in section 49 of the Consumer Rights Act 2015, and also applies under common law principles of negligence – and requires service providers, in this case, the university, to exercise reasonable skill and care in the provision of their services to consumers, in this instance, Meagher as a student.

    The question in this case is whether the university, by failing to implement the adjustments recommended by its own ADRC, breached this duty of care by not conducting his PhD viva with the requisite skill and care, considering his disability. Meagher argues that the university’s failure to implement the ADRC’s recommendations, which he says were specific to his needs and aimed at ensuring a fair and accessible assessment process, constitutes a breach of this duty.

    And at the heart of all that is the question of competence standards and how they intersect with reasonable adjustments for disabled students under the Equality Act 2010.

    Competence standards

    Competence standards are essentially the academic benchmarks used to assess whether a student has attained the necessary knowledge, skills, and abilities for a particular qualification. You’ll recall from the Natasha Abrahart case that there was disagreement about whether presenting in-person to a lecture theatre was itself a required competence, or merely a way of assessing competence that could be (reasonably) adjusted.

    The Equality Act doesn’t require universities to adjust competence standards to accommodate disabled students – but it does require universities to make reasonable adjustments to the assessment processes used to evaluate a student’s competence.

    This distinction is crucial in Meagher’s case because he argues that the university’s failure to implement certain adjustments, specifically those recommended by the ADRC, resulted in him being disadvantaged in demonstrating his competence during his viva.

    He argues that requiring him to take the viva in a standard format, without the recommended adjustments, placed him at a substantial disadvantage due to his disabilities, and that they were necessary to enable him to fairly demonstrate his understanding of the subject matter and meet the PhD competence standard.

    Meagher proposed that his PhD assessment be based on an analysis of his published academic papers, a method already used for university staff, rather than a traditional thesis. He requested a legally-qualified editor to proofread his thesis for aesthetic and presentation standards, along with significant restructuring or adjustments to the viva process. His proposed adjustments included written feedback from examiners on areas needing improvement, followed by revisions and reassessment, as well as receiving written questions and a detailed agenda seven days prior to the viva to reduce anxiety.

    To further support his needs, Meagher requested oral questions be linked to specific thesis sections in active voice, pauses and breaks after oral questions for cognitive processing, and the ability to write down questions for clarity. He also sought the option to clarify ambiguous questions with examiner explanations and breaks of at least ten minutes every hour to manage fatigue and maintain focus during the viva.

    The Student Support Document (SSD) created by the ADRC included much of that – but Meagher says that the university failed to provide it to the examiners before the viva, leaving them unaware of his disabilities and the necessary adjustments – only providing a list of adjustments. He also alleges that adjustments to the viva format were not made – the examiners, he says, failed to avoid unnotified topics, clearly signpost questions, and accommodate the thesis format.

    He was then granted an interim injunction against the university in July 2024 preventing it from taking any action over his PhD course or examination without consent from both parties pending the conclusion of the legal proceedings.

    Two big issues

    In other words, there are two things going on. On the one hand, in the discrimination arguments the student wants clarity over the reasonable adjustments/competence standards issue before that re-examination issue goes ahead.

    Depending on what happens next, there could be significant implications across the sector as it continues to try to wrangle reasonable adjustments to assessment and the differences between competence standards in a subject that shouldn’t change, and mere methods for assessing them that could.

    On the other hand, the potential compensation would be higher if Meagher was able to make the contract/tort arguments for a breach of contract and the implied duty to act with reasonable skill and care. Crucial there is whether, once it was agreed, the plan from the ADRC became part of the contract with the student – where if so we’re into avoiding foreseeable harm and so on. And that matters because it looks like it could create a form of duty of care.

    On that issue, in the County Court Meagher argued that the failure to implement adjustments for his viva constituted breaches of contract and tort – but the judge reasoned that that was an attempt to improperly import the statutory duty to make reasonable adjustments under the Equality Act 2010 into contractual and duties of care.

    But on appeal in the High Court, the contract and tort claims have been reinstated – the judge found that the County Court judge had got it wrong on “you’re trying to use two bits of law on one issue,” and argued that once it had agreed them, the university had separate contractual and tortious duties to implement the recommendations, irrespective of whether those recommendations aligned with the reasonable adjustments duty under the Equality Act.

    And so that’s where things now get very interesting – because of who the pressure goes on now in any tug of war between professional services and academics that disabled students often find themselves in.

    Where will the pressure fall?

    It is possible that the pressure goes onto academic departments. If universities face potential legal liability for breaches of contract or tort when they fail to implement their reasonable adjustment plans, that could strengthen the hand of frustrated disabled students, and strengthen the authority of disability services departments within universities to ensure that their recommendations are given due weight and followed through.

    It could also mean better training for academic staff on disability law, or clearer procedures for communicating and implementing reasonable adjustments so academic departments are aware of their obligations.

    But it’s also possible that the risk of legal action causes universities to pressure their professional disability staff to be more cautious in creating and publishing reasonable adjustment plans that they could later be held to account over. They may put in steps like ensuring relevant academics agree first, slowing down already slow processes. There may also be a chilling effect on adjustments that beleaguered staff know will be hard to get academic staff to agree to.

    And of course there’s more to run here – in the eventual potential outcome of the case – on what is and isn’t a reasonable adjustment to a PhD viva as a method of assessment.

    What is clear is that the chances of an individual student having the money, time or smarts to take a case as far as Meagher has so far are slim. It also remains the case that disabled students’ rights in areas like this are desperately unclear, that the legal frameworks surrounding them interact in potentially unhelpful ways, and their access to support is heavily restricted once at the end of their course.

    Someone, somewhere – perhaps OfS’ Disability in Higher Education Advisory Panel – needs to grip these issues properly. And next time Janet Daby is forced to issue an answer like “well it’s for the courts to decide”, perhaps she could remind herself and her boss in the other place that she’s a lawmaker.

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  • Supporting Students Formerly in Foster Care

    Supporting Students Formerly in Foster Care

    Title: Addressing Challenges and Support for Youth Formerly in Foster Care

    Author: Ellie Taylor

    Source: Trellis Strategies

    Youth formerly in foster care (YFFC) face complex and heightened demands with regard to postsecondary education. In a new brief from Trellis Strategies, the author discusses the distinct needs of YFFC who pursue higher education.

    Trellis Strategies’ 2023 Student Financial Wellness Survey found that YFFC have considerably lower levels of food security compared to their peers, while the share of housing insecure YFFC students is 28 percentage points higher than that of non-YFFC students. Additionally, more than seven in 10 YFFC students did not know if their institutions had aid programs for them.

    Most institutions do not have a means of identifying YFFC if they do not first identify themselves, complicating their ability to help students. However, less than 40 percent of students who indicated their YFFC status on their FAFSA reported receiving more funding. While 18 percent of students knew about institutional aid opportunities and 25 percent knew about state aid opportunities, 63 and 54 percent of students who were aware of these programs, respectively, participated in them.

    The report highlights four key policy recommendations:

    • Fund and appoint liaisons for YFFC. Institutions should have a full-time staff member dedicated to supporting YFFC students.
    • Cultivate more awareness of support for students. Develop and sustain communication between higher education institutions and foster programs in order to build a robust awareness of resources for YFFC students and identify YFFC students.
    • Develop accessible programs for YFFC. Make programs, including trauma-informed counseling and academic support, convenient and free for YFFC.
    • Offer food and housing assistance. Designate specific housing for YFFC and provide aid to ease the financial burden of housing and food.

    Read the full report here.

    —Kara Seidel

    If you have any questions or comments about this blog post, please contact us.

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